To produce longer-lived, more resilient laying hens capable of achieving high performance in cage-free systems, greater emphasis and subsequent reward must be placed on quality pullet development.
The global egg industry faces increasing pressure to improve productivity and welfare whilst reducing environmental and financial costs. In the UK there is ongoing pressure to ban enriched cages, despite currently producing ~83% of eggs in cage-free systems, which are more costly and complex to manage than caged systems, due to increased labour requirements, disease challenges and behavioural considerations. Pressure to eliminate enriched cages continues to grow, yet replacing this production would require more than three billion additional cage-free eggs annually. Whilst some demand can be met through housing conversion and building, improving flock performance will be essential to maintain supply efficiently. Significant performance differences exist between and within countries, with Germany producing 27% more eggs per bird than the UK in 2024 and UK free-range flocks averaging 378 eggs per bird, compared with over 570 in top-performing flocks. Improving persistency of lay, disease resilience and feather cover, presents an opportunity to increase egg output from existing housing capacity, whilst improving welfare and sustainability.
Pullet rearing accounts for approximately 20% of a laying hen’s life and represents a critical period of skeletal, physiological, behavioural and immune development. However, pullet development should not be viewed as ending at transfer, as development continues until around 30 weeks of age, meaning responsibility for optimum development is shared between the rearing and laying farmer.